<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
<meta charset="UTF-8">
<title>Only One You Need by savior</title>
<style type="text/css">

body { background-color: #ffffff; }
.CI {
text-align:center;
margin-top:0px;
margin-bottom:0px;
padding:0px;
}
.center   {text-align: center;}
.cover    {text-align: center;}
.full     {width: 100%; }
.quarter  {width: 25%; }
.smcap    {font-variant: small-caps;}
.u        {text-decoration: underline;}
.bold     {font-weight: bold;}
</style>
</head>
<body>
<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/25184065">Only One You Need</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/savior/pseuds/savior'>savior</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>SHINee</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Aftercare, Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, BDSM, Blindfolds, Butt Plugs, Cock Rings, Cock Worship, Collars, Coming Out, Dom/sub, Drug Abuse, Dubious Consent, First Time, Gags, Handcuffs, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Mental Health Issues, Nipple Clamps, Orgasm Denial, Praise Kink, Puppy Play, Rope Bondage, Spanking, Subdrop, Violet Wand</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>In-Progress</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-07-10</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-08-09</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-05 07:47:03</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Explicit</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>2</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>9,446</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/25184065</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/savior/pseuds/savior</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Jonghyun is a salary man who feels like his life is slipping out of control. After a recommendation from a new acquaintance, he decides to book a one-on-one session with a professional dominant. Enter Key, who seems to know exactly what he needs.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Kim Jonghyun/Kim Kibum | Key, Kim Yongsun | Solar/Moon Byulyi | Moonbyul</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>17</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>24</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>1. Prologue</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>“Just the one person?”</p><p>Jonghyun nods at the bouncer, flashing him a crooked, charming smile. He’s drunk. He’s been drinking since 4pm that afternoon. Beer, first, then harder liquor as the night drew on.</p><p>At the front door of the club, though, he can feign sobriety. He’s had so much practise, after all.</p><p>Everything is slowed down around Jonghyun. If he doesn’t concentrate all his energy into focusing his vision, the bouncer in front of him splits into two, with four beady eyes to scrutinise his every move. His nametag is too blurry to read – Jonghyun only spares it a quick glance, before steeling his gaze on the man’s face ones more, thighs tensing in an effort to stop himself from swaying back and forth. “Yes,” he adds, clear and rehearsed, “just me, please.”</p><p>Of course, the bouncer lets him in. Jonghyun has gotten good at pretending.</p><p>The music is always the same - some mixture of trance, deep house and techno. Jonghyun doesn’t care much for genre, as long as he can dance to it.</p><p>The club is packed from floor to ceiling. The dancefloor is a sweaty mass of writhing bodies; Jonghyun slips easily into the mass, and the crowd seems to part for him, as if welcoming him home. With each beat of the bass-heavy track, the room moves as one, an organism in its own right. The bodies surrounding Jonghyun shove him harshly from side to side, his movements a little too slow, his steps too clumsy.</p><p>Jonghyun closes his eyes. He can feel the loud music pumping through his chest, his wrists, his brain. His body pulsates with each sound, and he lets his head fall backwards, the strobe lights dancing across his eyelids in vibrant patterns. Jonghyun moves with them, hips shifting steadily to the count of the synthetic drums. His skin bristles as clothes fabric and sweat-slick limbs brush against his exposed arms, sometimes gently, sometimes less so. The music throbs in his head, flushing out all of his thoughts, but Jonghyun doesn’t need to think. He just needs to follow the movements of the crowd.</p><p>His body begins to heat up; there are arms grabbing at him, pulling at his waist, inviting him to lose control. Jonghyun sinks into the gesture. He allows himself to be dragged. Accepts the bodies that begin grinding against his back and chest, so close that Jonghyun finds it hard to move, hard to breathe. Jonghyun lets himself go, entirely.</p><p>This is where Jonghyun feels alive.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>this fic has been dyyyying to get out lately after being in my head for literally years, so i'm finally writing it down. hopefully you all enjoy the concept as much as i do! i decided to include a prologue just to help with jjong's characterisation, but be warned, the chapters will probably be pretty long after this so buckle up :))</p><p>the tags will be updated as i go along (i'm still in the process of writing it, so if anything else happens to pop in which i've forgotten about (probably!!) then i'll make sure to add!). i dont think any archive warnings will apply to the story, but i'm just gonna note that jonghyun shows some mental illness in this fic. so please don't read any further if that's going to make you upset - i debated whether to leave in that aspect, since i've been planning this since before the events of 2017, but in the end it's quite essential to the storyline</p><p>finally, shout out to all my veteran shawols who still appreciate the jongkey pairing. i've been missing them lately, and there's definitely been a jk void in the community lately, so hopefully this can help fill it!</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0002"><h2>2. Chapter 2</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Jonghyun sits in a dimly-lit booth, one arm stretched out on the wooden table in front of him. His shoes, scuffed a little at the edges, rest gently against the banquette opposite, feet tap-tap-tapping against the dirtied leather. The top two buttons of his shirt are undone, tie having been shoved roughly into the bag underneath him many hours ago.</p><p>It’s Friday night. Unsurprising, then, that Jonghyun finds himself sitting in a bar. Work has been particularly hard lately – for the past 5 days, Jonghyun has been battling 12-hour long shifts, cooped up in a cubical somewhere in central Seoul, a slave to his company director. He hadn’t planned on it being like this. If Jonghyun had had his way, he would be working with a humanitarian aid group by now, or helping to eliminate homelessness. Unfortunately, he had realised too late that a bachelor’s in sociology would get him nowhere in life. And so, here he is, living out each day as a rat on the corporate wheel, for an organisation whose values he couldn’t care less about, where career advancement means a salary raise, and strictly that.</p><p>Jonghyun isn’t complaining about the pay. He lives a cushy lifestyle. He has a nice car, rents an apartment in a nice part of town, shops for groceries in fancy supermarkets, and has more than enough left over to go out with friends and colleagues when the week is over. The problem is that he is bored of it all. The work he does is stressful, unfulfilling, and at age just 28, he already feels stifled. The future as he envisions it is an unending cycle of waiting until the next payday, whilst completing the same tasks, day-in day-out, in the same grey office block, for 40 years until retirement. There is no room for growth or improvement. As far as Jonghyun is concerned, none of his own qualities are particularly required for the role – save for, perhaps, the obstinate willpower he has to finish something once he’s started it, or the practised ease with which he can smile and pretend to ignore the crushing pain of his dull existence – and he is no more indispensable than a candy bar packed into a vending machine, whose only purpose is to topple over at someone else’s will.</p><p>Jonghyun is bored, and the boredom numbs him. But he is human. He needs excitement. Risk.</p><p>So he acts out sometimes. It had started, innocently enough, with the gym. Jonghyun has always been on the shorter side; by working on his physique, he had managed to earn himself a set of abs, as well as shoulders wide enough so that he could wear whatever he wanted without it looking like he was drowning. If Jonghyun exercising had been solely about body image, he could feasibly have stopped there. In the end, though, it became more than that – as his working hours increased, so did his time at the gym, and pushing his body to the limit was a way for Jonghyun to feel like he was taking back control. The more intense the workout, the easier it was to zone out and forget about the stacks of papers waiting for him at his desk. The struggle to lift more, run further, sweat harder, gave Jonghyun renewed purpose. The constant ache in his muscles served as a reminder that he was real.</p><p>The most toxic of Jonghyun’s bad habits, though, is his drinking. Anyone around him can attest to that. Things that happen as a result of Jonghyun’s drinking – casual hook-ups, excessive overspending, accidental self-injury, overeating, forgetting to eat – notwithstanding, the root of most of his problems is his alcohol dependency. It’s not like he needs it to function. For Jonghyun, alcohol is more like a disinhibitor. It sets him free. It allows him to act upon his innermost desires; gives him the strength to pour out his heart, authentic, unrestrained, to anyone who might be listening. And, more importantly, when Jonghyun’s sobriety returns, the shameful memories from the night before return to the depths of his subconscious, as if they’d only surfaced in the first place as part of an elaborate dream. Most of the time.</p><p>He’s tried to quit. Once or twice, he’s tried. It’s the transition period between addiction and sobriety that Jonghyun really can’t seem to surpass. The point at which he’s forced to act without the drunken haze that usually lingers over his brain, and to face the consequences of his actions with absolute clarity.</p><p>A soju bottle is set down onto the table in front of him. Jonghyun glances up through his dark fringe, watching as Minho, his best friend, slides into the booth next to him, seat dipping under the weight of a new body.</p><p>“Grapefruit,” says Minho, nodding towards the bottle, round eyes gleaming as he stares at Jonghyun. “Hyung should pour me some.”</p><p>At his words, Jonghyun turns to face Minho fully, mouth slightly agape. Minho has been Jonghyun’s friend for the better part of two decades, having lived as a child in the same apartment complex. Despite there being a year age difference between them, Jonghyun had been more than happy to hang around with someone other than his noona, Sodam – the only other kid in the building that was even close to Jonghyun’s age – and besides, befriending Minho meant that he finally had someone else who shared his interest in videogames. An interest that was short-lived once he realised how seriously Minho would take their occasional Xbox duels. Minho’s competitiveness scares Jonghyun to this day, but he will never admit it.</p><p>Blinking a few times in mock-indignance, Jonghyun pushes the soju bottle back towards Minho. “Are you crazy?” he begins, voice going up a few octaves, “Is something wrong with your head? Were you dropped as a baby, to be treating your hyung like this? Did nobody ever teach you manners?”</p><p>Minho holds his gaze. They sit in silence for a few moments, their booth a stark contrast to the rowdy, ambient noise of the bar that they’re in.</p><p>Letting out a deep sigh, Minho finally cracks, and reaches out to twist the cap off the soju. “You are so difficult,” he starts, pouring the liquid steadily into both glasses, “at our old age, after all the years I’ve suffered by your side, you are still treating me as your slave. Really, it’s a shame.”</p><p>Jonghyun fights the urge to roll his eyes, but is unable to stop the grin that tugs at the corners of his lips. He loves getting on Minho’s nerves.</p><p>“Slaves don’t talk back. Yah, you put more in your glass. Fill it up to here.” Jonghyun pokes out a finger to tap at his glass, adding a generous few centimetres to the level of soju that’s already inside.</p><p>Minho scowls, but complies. “Yes, master,” he responds. And then, in a more conversational tone, “I hope you don’t mind, I invited a friend this time. Someone from work.”</p><p>“That’s fine. I don’t mind,” Jonghyun swiftly replies, softness returning to his voice. He smiles fondly at Minho, eyes turning up into crescent moons as they clink their glasses, before each taking a sip. The pair often meet for drinks like this after work. It’s not uncommon for others to tag along and, unless Jonghyun is in desperate need of a heart-to-heart conversation, he enjoys the extra company. “Just a friend?”</p><p>Minho swallows his drink just in time to choke out a laugh. “It’s a guy. His name is Taemin.” He puts his glass down on the table and wipes his mouth, before continuing, “He’s in the tech department, but we’ve been on a few of the same projects. Sometimes we take our lunch break together.”</p><p>“How cute,” quips Jonghyun.</p><p>The younger flashes a grin. “I think you’ll like him. Actually, he should be here soon.” He leans over, pulling his phone out of his back pocket, and lights up the display to check the time. “Five more minutes.”</p><p>In fact, it’s another twenty minutes, and one empty soju bottle later, before Minho’s phone finally begins to buzz, the shrill sound of the ringtone cutting through their conversation. At this point, the bar has already begun to fill up. For a moment, Jonghyun wonders if Minho’s friend will be able to find their table through the growing crowds of people – that is, until Minho stands up, waving a long arm and shouting <em>Taemin-ah!</em> with such volume that the table in front turn around to shoot him a disgruntled look. Jonghyun sinks further into his seat.</p><p>He doesn’t know what he was expecting Taemin to look like, but it certainly isn’t the blond-haired, chubby faced, brightly-smiling man that slides into the banquette opposite. There’s this youthful, glowing aura around him – if Jonghyun had to guess, he would say the other was no older than his early twenties.</p><p>Taemin lifts an arm to nudge his hair out of his face, ducking a little under Jonghyun’s scrutiny. “Hello, nice to meet you,” he says in formal Korean.</p><p>“Hi,” replies Jonghyun. And then, turning to Minho, “I was expecting another hyung.”</p><p>Minho hits his thigh underneath the table. The action doesn’t go unnoticed by Taemin, who giggles, shoulders slumping into a more relaxed position. “Yah, be more polite. Besides, isn’t he cute? He looks younger than he is.” He reaches across the booth to pinch Taemin’s cheek, who, to Jonghyun’s surprise, barely flinches with the action. “He’s just two years younger than me.”</p><p>Jonghyun’s eyebrows shoot up. “Really?” He moves his gaze over to Taemin, who is staring intently at the table in front of him. “You were born in ’93?”</p><p>The younger looks up. He chews on his lips, before replying, simply, “yes.”</p><p>“Ah. And you go to lunch with Minho often?”</p><p>“Yes.”</p><p>“You don’t talk much, do you?”</p><p>Jonghyun can be blunt sometimes, but to his relief, Taemin doesn’t seem to take much offense to his question. He flashes his teeth, tugging at the ends of his jacket sleeves as he moves his arms onto the table, and then back onto his lap. “I—” he begins, before Minho interrupts.</p><p>“Yah, be nice to my friend, will you? Taeminnie, would you like a drink?”</p><p>Taemin shakes his head, shifting as he crosses his legs. “No, thank you. Actually, I don’t really like to drink.”</p><p>“You don’t like to drink?” Jonghyun narrows his eyes at Minho, pointing a thumb at him. “And he invited you to a bar?”</p><p>Taemin turns to Minho, who squeezes his eyes shut momentarily. When he opens them, it’s to reach forwards and grab his drink, which he downs. “We’re going to the club. Taeminnie likes to dance. I figured you wouldn’t mind.”</p><p>Minho’s words hang in the air for a few moments. It’s been years since he and Jonghyun went to a club together. He’s never really been into that scene – rather than stay out til the early hours drinking, Jonghyun has always known him to prefer heading home early, ready for his morning jog at 6am or some other similar crazy time. Besides, since Jonghyun got into the habit of clubbing alone, it’s been a touchy conversation topic for the two of them.</p><p>As if reading his mind, Minho continues, albeit reluctantly. “Look, you don’t have to come. I know you go there every week. I just thought it might be fun, since Taemin told me that he likes clubbing too.” He pauses, looking at the man in question, and adds, “right, Taemin?”</p><p>Taemin smiles sweetly, seemingly blissfully unaware of the tension which permeates the air around him. “Right. I like the loud music, too.”</p><p>Jonghyun reaches for his glass. “You like music? What kind?”</p><p>“Any kind,” Taemin replies, and Jonghyun catches the glint in his eye. “As long as I can dance to it.”</p><p>As it turns out, Taemin wasn’t kidding. The club they end up at is a little dingy at best, a health and safety hazard at worst. It’s small, smaller than Jonghyun is used to, and the lack of windows means that everything inside is covered in a thick cloud of fog, a mixture of sweat and cigarette smoke. Jonghyun can hardly see three metres in front of his face, and his chest starts to tighten with the effort of just breathing. Luckily, Minho is beside him, keeping the three of them together, arms hooked around the shoulders of both of his friends. He guides them to the cloakrooms on Taemin’s instructions, and then onto the dancefloor.</p><p>The music is okay. Nothing special, but it has a beat, and the beat is easy to follow. When they reach the edge of the floor, Taemin starts to move; slowly, at first, the lines of his body ebbing and swirling like waves; gentle, as if working in a vacuum, unbothered by the people that bump into him, pushing him back and forth. Jonghyun watches for a few moments, mesmerised, as he matches his own movements to the song’s tempo. It’s Minho’s hand clamping down on his shoulder that finally catches his attention. Swinging his head around, he watches Minho motion a drink with his hand, barely making out the thumb that’s gesturing towards the bar, a silent question. Jonghyun nods and, just like that, Minho is gone.</p><p>The song changes. A quicker song, this time. When Jonghyun moves his gaze back to Taemin, the younger has his eyes closed, head thrown back, a smile stretching wide across his lips. It’s all too easy for Jonghyun to follow suit, body moving closer to the other as he begins to sway. Taemin opens his eyes for a moment – and Jonghyun feels mildly guilty, for breaking him out of his daydream – and adjusts his motions until they are in tandem, eyes fluttering shut once more. For a while, that’s how they stay. Jonghyun loses track of the time that’s passed since Minho went to the bar – in his tipsy state, it’s difficult to pay attention to anything more than the man dancing with him, and the grainy songs that bleed through the speakers, sending shockwaves into the floor beneath them. One thing that Jonghyun does eventually notice, though, is the lack of drink in his hand. It bothers him enough to reach an arm up around Taemin’s neck, pulling him closer to murmur into his ear, “Where’s Minho?”</p><p>He draws back to stare at the younger’s face, eyebrows furrowed in question when the only reply is a shoulder shrug. Luckily, they haven’t moved much further into the crowd of dancers and, glancing to his right, Jonghyun tries his best to find the easiest route to the bar. He lets Taemin out of his embrace, jerking his head in a silent request for the other to follow.</p><p>“Should I text him?” he hears Taemin shout from behind, but they’re halfway there, and years of friendship and late replies have taught Jonghyun that Minho never looks at his phone, anyway. Instead of responding he moves aside so that Taemin can catch up with him, reaching a hand out to splay across his shoulder blades, and gives him a gentle push.</p><p>Minho has the nerve to look surprised when Jonghyun finally sidles up next to him, Taemin in tow. Jonghyun shoots a pointed glance at the three empty glasses on top of the bar, then at the half-full one in Minho’s hands. “Mine?” he asks, pointing down at it, voice raised over the music.</p><p>Minho blinks, missing a beat as he stares down into his lap. “Yes,” he slurs. “Yours.” He holds the glass out to Jonghyun, fingers slipping on the condensation, and Jonghyun quickly takes it from him.</p><p>“Are you okay?” he asks. Minho squints a little in question, as if it will help him to hear better, and Jonghyun holds up his fingers, motioning an <em>ok?</em> gesture. To his dismay, the other shakes his head slowly.</p><p>“No. I’m…toilet.”</p><p><em>Yeah</em> Jonghyun murmurs, too quiet to be heard. At the same time, he feels Taemin tapping at his shoulder, and warm breath ghosting over the shell of his ear before he even has a chance to turn around. “I’ll go,” the younger offers, half-shouting. “I need it too.”</p><p>Jonghyun nods dumbly. His best friend is swaying dangerously forward, so he puts the glass down on the bar in a hurry, sticking both arms out for support. Taemin circles around them to stand at Minho’s other side, rubbing a hand over his back. Together, they somehow manage to get Minho safely down off the barstool, and Jonghyun lets himself breathe a sigh of relief as he watches Taemin loop Minho’s arm around his neck, holding his weight, while he guides him in the direction of the toilets. At least he doesn’t have to deal with it this time; it’s awkward, trying to carry someone half a foot taller than him.</p><p>When the two men are out of sight, Jonghyun slides into the nearest empty seat. He takes a sip of his drink, wrinkling his nose at the flavour. Whisky isn’t his favourite, but he’s not going to let it go to waste.</p><p>Tapping at the side of his glass, he glances around the bar, looking for a drinks menu, but is surprised when his eyes land on a phone instead. Self-consciously, he checks his own pockets. His phone is exactly where he left it. Realising that it might be Taemin’s – he was standing on that side of Jonghyun, after all – he reaches out, sliding the device closer to him. After a few seconds of reflection, he decides to light up the lock screen.</p><p>The screen glare hurts his eyes at first, and he has to make an effort to focus his vision enough to read anything. The first thing he makes out is a software update notification. Then, as he scans his eyes further down the screen, he’s met with text message after text message. The name of the sender is the same for all of them – <em>Mistress</em> – and for each notification, the full body of text is too long to be displayed. Without giving it much thought, Jonghyun pulls down on the most recent message notification, displaying the text in full.</p><p>
  <em>Useless slave. Your time is up. I tried to warn you. Did you think the last beating was bad? When I’m finished with you, nobody will recognise your face. You worthless, weak bitch. You are nothing. Nothing without me. Nobody will ever want you as I do. Nobody will ever care for you as I do. This is the last time you disrespect me, and I will make sure you remember it.</em>
</p><p>It takes Jonghyun a few goes to read over the message. He can’t believe what he’s seeing. When he catches himself, though, he quickly dims the screen, regret already setting in.</p><p>Clearing his throat, he lifts up his hand, waving to get the bartender’s attention. Instead of ordering beer or soju like he usually would, he points down at his remaining drink, and shouts <em>stronger</em> once the bartender is within hearing distance. As he downs the rest of the glass, alcohol searing his throat, he feels a hand on his shoulder. It’s Taemin.</p><p>The younger leans over until his mouth is level with Jonghyun’s ear. “Minho’s throwing up. Is he okay?”</p><p>Jonghyun blinks. How would he know? He’s been sitting right here. But when he notices Taemin’s worried expression, he reaches a hand out to squeeze his upper arm, plastering a reassuring smile onto his face. Saying yes would probably be a lie at this point, but Minho is big boy. He can look after himself. So Jonghyun flashes Taemin a thumbs up, watching with interest as his features relax, crease disappearing from in between his eyebrows.</p><p>“Also,” Taemin continues, swaying closer again, “I lost my phone.”</p><p>Jonghyun feels his heart drop. It’s difficult for him to keep his face neutral as he reaches over, picking up the phone in question. When Taemin spots it, his eyes light up.</p><p>“You found it,” he beams, bowing in thanks as Jonghyun hands it to him, his stomach starting to churn. As Taemin slides into a barstool, Jonghyun finds himself staring, his mind racing with questions. <em>Who sent you that message?</em>, he wants to ask. <em>Is it your girlfriend? Are you being abused?</em></p><p>Taemin doesn’t notice him, however, because his gaze is cast down, eyes fixated on his phone screen. Jonghyun follows the younger’s digits as he opens up his text messages, hesitating slightly, before beginning to type a response.</p><p>The bartender arrives with Jonghyun’s drink. It catches Taemin’s attention, who looks up, briefly making eye contact with the elder. Flustered, Jonghyun averts his eyes.</p><p>
  <em>Should I mention it? Does Minho already know?</em>
</p><p>“What’s that?” Taemin’s voice cuts through his thoughts. He means the drink, obviously, but when Jonghyun turns, the younger is regarding him with a soft expression.</p><p>“Whiskey and coke,” he replies, not bothering to raise his voice over the music. He wonders if he looks guilty.</p><p>Taemin makes a face. <em>Yeah, me, too</em>, thinks Jonghyun, and he tries not to stare again when Taemin turns back to his phone, resuming his typing. Instead, he takes a big swig of his drink. Thankfully, the more whiskey Jonghyun ingests, the easier it seems to go down.</p><p>He decides not to intervene. If Taemin knows what he saw, then it seems he doesn’t want to talk about it. If he doesn’t know, then Jonghyun feels as though bringing up the fact that he snooped through Taemin’s phone won’t cause the younger to open up any more, anyway. And so, with every ounce of willpower, Jonghyun tries to keep his mouth shut, and to push what he’s seen to the furthest corner of his mind.</p><p>Unfortunately, the longer Jonghyun is left drinking, the less rational he becomes. It’s 4am when the three friends finally leave the club – joined by several hyungs that Minho had managed to collect, inexplicably, whilst puking up his guts in the toilet – and make their way to the nearest 7-Eleven for snacks. Once they arrive, Jonghyun plonks himself down on the curb, and Taemin squats beside him.</p><p>“Yah, get me some water,” he shouts at Minho, who shoots him a thumbs up without looking, too engrossed in conversation with his new friends as they swing open the shop door. At least Minho seems to have perked up, but Jonghyun can already feel a headache coming on. He’d lost count of how many whiskey cokes he’d drunk after the fourth, but either way, he knows it was one too many.</p><p>Taemin lifts up a hand to rub at Jonghyun’s back. “Are you okay, hyung?” he asks, not a hint of tipsiness in his voice. Jonghyun envies him.</p><p>“Aigoo, hyung’s head hurts. He drank too much.” When he turns to face Taemin he has to force himself not to go cross-eyed. The younger is staring at him with a concerned expression. It’s cute, and Jonghyun feels a little sad, remembering what had happened earlier. Shouldn’t he be comforting Taemin? “Are you okay?”</p><p>Taemin blinks. “Yes, I’m fine.” He flashes a small smile, hand still warm and soft, splayed out over the back of his shirt.</p><p>The moment feels intimate. Behind Taemin, the sun has just started to peek over the horizon, lighting up the edges of his silhouette in a pastel glow. Jonghyun shuffles a little closer to him, close enough that Taemin’s shins are brushing against his thighs, and when he reaches out a hand to mess with a strand of his hair, he physically feels Taemin freeze. “Taeminnie…are we friends?”</p><p>Taemin’s eyebrows furrow. He shifts a little on his feet, hand on Jonghyun’s back going still. “Um, I guess, if hyung wants. I mean, we had a good night. Why?”</p><p>Jonghyun gulps. “So we can talk about, like, deep stuff?”</p><p>“Um…” Taemin trails off, biting on his lip, and flitting his gaze everywhere except the elder. “Like, what do you mean, hyung?”</p><p>“If something was bothering you, would you talk about it with me?”</p><p>“I mean, I guess so.” He flicks his eyes up at Jonghyun, before staring back down at the ground. “But nothing is bothering me.”</p><p>“Really?” Jonghyun presses. Taemin nods emphatically. “Taeminnie…” Jonghyun trails off, letting his hand drop from Taemin’s hair to the floor, and leaning against it. He chews on the inside of his cheek, taking a deep breath. “When you left your phone at the bar…I wasn’t sure if it was yours. So I unlocked it. And I read the first message. It…um…worried me a little.”</p><p>Taemin’s hand slides off Jonghyun’s back. When he looks up again, his expression is unreadable. “I…guess that’s okay, hyung,” he says, and then, after a few seconds of deliberation, “what was it that you read, exactly?”</p><p>Jonghyun turns his head away, staring intently into the window of the 7-Eleven. He makes out the fuzzy image of Minho, standing in the queue, arms folded around a mountain of snacks. They don’t have much time. “It was a text. It…wasn’t very nice. They were threatening to hurt you.” He glances at Taemin. “Was it your girlfriend? You shouldn’t be with someone who talks to you like that, you know.”</p><p>Taemin blinks at him. And then, to Jonghyun’s surprise, the younger lets out a laugh.</p><p>“What’s so funny? Yah, I’m being serious.”</p><p>“Hyung…” he watches Taemin put his face in his hands, the tips of his ears turning red, betraying the blush that’s spread across his cheeks. “Hyung, it’s, uh, not what it looks like. Don’t worry.”</p><p>“It’s not what it looks like?” Jonghyun sways forwards, and Taemin snaps his head up. “Then what?”</p><p>“What do you mean?”</p><p>“Why were they talking to you like that?”</p><p>“Ah.” Shuffling away from Jonghyun almost imperceptibly, Taemin brings a hand up to rub at his temple. “Hyung, it’s really not a big deal. Don’t worry about it too much.”</p><p>He shouldn’t push it. He really shouldn’t. But, “You can’t let people talk to you that way, Taeminnie. You are too polite. Really, very sweet. You need to learn to stick up for yourself.” He holds out a hand, palm facing up, and ends up hitting Taemin lightly in the shoulder with it. “Give me your phone. I will text them back for you.”</p><p>“Hyung, uh, that’s really not necessary.”</p><p>“Then what did you reply? Please, tell me that you gave them a piece of your mind.”</p><p>Taemin looks up at the sky, as if praying for help. A few seconds pass, before he replies, softly, “I said sorry. They weren’t really mad, hyung. It’s just a game that we play. That’s all.”</p><p>“A game? What kind of a game is that?” Jonghyun asks, voice coming out a little louder than necessary. It might be the alcohol, but he can’t wrap his head around Taemin’s explanation. “Then why did you say sorry?”</p><p>“That’s a part of the game, too.”</p><p>“Yah.” Jonghyun closes his eyes, pinching the bridge of his nose. “You don’t really mean game, right? It’s a metaphor for something else.” He turns to the younger. Expression softening, he reaches out his hand to shake gently at Taemin’s shoulder. “I told you, you can talk to me. So what is it?”</p><p>When Taemin glances back down at Jonghyun, his gaze is calculating. Jonghyun tilts his head to the side. He knows he must look ridiculous, trying to gain Taemin’s trust with his puppy dog eyes, but, frankly, he’s a little too drunk to care. Taemin’s Adam’s apple bobs up and down, and then, in a quiet voice, he says, “Okay, so it’s not a game. It’s, um…” he pauses, choosing his words carefully. “It’s just, something that we like to do. I, um. I kind of like it. When she’s mean to me.”</p><p>Jonghyun raises his eyebrows, an incredulous expression creeping onto his face. “You want her to hurt you like that?”</p><p>Taemin chokes out a laugh, head nodding as he stares at the tarmac in front of him. “Yeah. Sometimes she ties me up and whips me, too.”</p><p>It’s so deadpan, the way Taemin describes it, that Jonghyun is genuinely speechless for a few moments. He isn’t sure if it’s meant to be a joke, but the way Taemin is avoiding eye contact, bottom lip clamped firmly in between his teeth, as if he’s said too much, suggests that he’s telling the truth.</p><p>He’s heard of it. Shit, he’s read Fifty Shades of Grey, like every other person on the planet. You don’t get to Jonghyun’s age without playing around a little in the bedroom, either. But the text that he’d read – the way that the person had been talking to Taemin, threatening him, as if he was less than human, just didn’t sit right with him. Really, he can’t fathom how anybody might be into that. The whips and chains, he can understand – the sexy, skin-tight, latex suits, and the leather harnesses that he’s seen in pornos, he can also get. But eating shit, and getting nothing back for it? Enjoying it, even?</p><p>“She called you a slave,” Jonghyun recalls, tone going up at the end, almost questioning.</p><p>“Yeah,” replies Taemin.</p><p>“And you’re fine with it? Being her slave? What’s in it for you?”</p><p>Taemin inhales deeply, hand coming up to scratch at his nose, self-conscious. “You ever just…” He turns his face towards Jonghyun, but keeps his eyes trained on the ground. “You ever just feel like you don’t know what you’re doing? Like you’re just getting by, but you don’t actually know what to do. And sometimes, you just don’t feel real—like you’re dreaming, or, as if someone else is controlling you. You wish you could wake up, because, the life you’re living. It doesn’t feel like your own. There’s no purpose to it. You don’t really feel anything at all.”</p><p>Jonghyun blinks, slowly. “Yeah, I do,” he replies.</p><p>He watches as Taemin finally peers up at him, eyebrows pulled slightly together. The younger’s voice rings with sincerity when he says, “Being with her. Doing what she says. It takes away that feeling, you know? Makes me feel like I’m…bigger than myself. Like I’m important.” Taemin chews on his lips, wavering a little, before he finishes. “That’s what I get out of it.”</p><p>Across the road, the door to 7-Eleven swings open. Minho steps out, plastic carrier bags nearly full to the brim with snacks, crinkling as they bump against each other. The hyungs that follow behind him are empty-handed, but one of them has a triangle kimbap half-sticking out of his mouth. Taemin stands up gracefully; Jonghyun less-so.</p><p>When the two are eye-level again, and just as Minho starts to cross the street, Taemin leans into Jonghyun’s ear, adding, “Oh, and she looks really hot in latex, too. Like, really, really hot.”</p><p>“Shit,” Jonghyun replies, slinging an arm around Taemin’s shoulder, mainly for balance. “Well, consider me sold.”</p><p>He’s joking – at least, that’s what he tells himself. When he arrives back in his apartment, though, Taemin’s words are still floating around in his head. The sensation he’d described is exactly what Jonghyun has been feeling – yet here Jonghyun is, with his alcoholism, and his reckless impulsiveness. What if all he needed was a dominatrix? The idea is so far-fetched, that it manages to root itself inside Jonghyun’s mind; and, unfortunately, once Jonghyun is attached to a thought, it’s difficult for him to get rid of it. So, plopping himself down on the sofa, the sunlight already peeking through the cracks in his blinds, he opens up his phone web browser, and types in <em>professional dominatrix in Seoul</em>.</p><p>There must be thousands of results that pop up. Jonghyun clicks on the first one. Although the layout is difficult to read in his drunken state – red text on a black background – he unscrambles it enough to realise that, rather than a directory of independently operating ‘mistresses’, which, for some reason, is what Jonghyun was expecting, the website seems to be advertising for a sex dungeon called<em> Nexus</em>. He’s about to press the back button, when he spots a tab that says <em>Dominants Available</em>. Curious, he opens it.</p><p>When the page loads, Jonghyun is assaulted with a wall of text. He squints. The words are all moving around on the phone screen but, from what Jonghyun can make out, there seems to be a list of names, each belonging to a dominatrix, followed by a short description of the services that they specialise in. Although he knows he should probably pay attention to their descriptions, the text is much too small for Jonghyun to be able to make anything out. He settles instead for just browsing through their names, an amused smirk playing at his lips when he goes down the list; <em>Goddess Vampyra, Mistress Payne, Key, Queen Electra—</em></p><p>Suddenly, his phone slips from his hands, dropping to the wooden floor with a loud clatter, before sliding under his coffee table. Jonghyun scrambles to pick it up, remembering, in a moment of clarity, that it’s 5am, and his downstairs neighbours are probably fast asleep. Or, were, at least. When he finally locates the phone though, turning the screen to face him, there’s a number typed into it, and – oh, <em>shit</em>, it’s calling—</p><p>Jonghyun presses the phone to his ear mid-way through the voicemail recording, instructing him to state his request, in as much detail as possible, and assuring him that the dungeon will get back to him soon. There’s a loud beep and, rather than hanging up, the only thought that goes through Jonghyun’s foggy brain is <em>ah, fuck, here we go</em>. “Hi—I was just looking at your website, uh, I’d like to book an appointment with one of your…staff?” He rubs his face, mind drawing a complete blank as he tries to remember somebody, anybody’s name. There was mistress…whatsherface…something morbid, and, if Jonghyun recalls correctly, all of them had a title, as well as a given name. Ah, except, “Key? If that’s, uh, possible. Thanks.”</p><p>He hangs up, immediately dropping his phone onto the coffee table, and buries his face into his hands, a long, miserable groan leaving his throat. In terms of the most stupid, embarrassing things that Jonghyun has done when he’s drunk, this has to rank pretty highly. After a few more seconds of sitting there, questioning his life choices, he forces himself to get up, heading to the bathroom, to avoid passing out on his sofa.</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p><p>The call back comes at 1pm the next afternoon, and Jonghyun is only a little ashamed to admit that it jolts him awake. Voice groggy and mind not yet working, he squints accusingly at his blinking phone screen, before answering, gruffly, “Hello?”</p><p>“Hello,” comes a chirpy, male voice on the other end. “This is Nexus. You rang this morning to inquire about our services?”</p><p>Jonghyun frowns, trying to remember if he’s already woken up once today. That is, until a sharp pain shoots through his temple, and he remembers leaving the club at 4am, and then—<em>oh</em>. “Y-yes,” he says, voice cracking, a knot starting to form in the pit of his stomach. “I did. Yes. Right.”</p><p>“Alright, well, it’s good that you remember. It’s not often we get calls at 5 o’clock in the morning,” the voice responds, and Jonghyun wants to bang his head into a wall. That’s the last time he’s ever drinking whiskey. “Have you used the facilities before?”</p><p>“No,” replies Jonghyun, feeling wildly out-of-his-depth.</p><p>“Okay, not a problem. I’m going to run you through some quick questions. How did you find out about us?”</p><p>Jonghyun pauses, trying to think of a believable, less embarrassing response than <em>through an internet search</em>, but in the end, he decides to go with the truth. Warm laughter rings through the phone speaker and into his ears, and Jonghyun feels himself relax slightly. For the next couple of minutes, the voice asks him a series of basic questions, such as <em>How old are you? Do you have a criminal record? Do you have any ongoing mental or physical illnesses that you’re aware of?</em>, which, Jonghyun assumes, are just part of the safety procedure. He answers them as directly and as honestly as possible.</p><p>“Excellent,” the voice says finally, and Jonghyun can barely make out the sound of paper moving in the background. “You asked for a session with Key specifically, right? Since you found us through our website, I’ll assume you’ve read through the profile section?”</p><p>“Yes,” Jonghyun lies, closing his eyes. He braces himself for more questions, but they don’t come – instead, Jonghyun hears a sigh of relief.</p><p>“Great. It’s always nice when clients do their own research before calling. It gets tiring reading out the Dom profiles again and again.”</p><p>“No problem,” Jonghyun responds through gritted teeth, and props himself up on one elbow. His laptop is on his bedside table, luckily, so he slides it over, booting it up as quickly as he can.</p><p>“Just so you know,” the voice continues, “we require you to have an initial meeting with the Dom before any play can happen, for screening purposes. You’ll be able to talk about your expectations for the session, fetishes, hard and soft limits, et cetera, in detail. It’s quite informal, so you don’t need to worry.”</p><p>Jonghyun raises his eyebrows. He hadn’t even considered that they’d need to screen their clients, but he supposes it makes sense. “That’s fine. Where will the meeting take place?”</p><p>“Usually in a café, but it will be up to the Dom to choose the exact location. Do you have an email address that you would feel comfortable sharing, so that Key can get in contact?”</p><p>After rattling off his work email – probably not the smartest choice – the call ends with Jonghyun giving his availability, and in turn, being promised a meeting within the next week. If he has to admit, it makes him a little uncomfortable, the idea of chatting with the person who’s supposed to be ‘tying up and whipping’ him, if Taemin’s experience is anything to go by. What is there to talk about? The man on the phone had mentioned something about hard and soft limits, but Jonghyun doesn’t know what that means. He realises, for the first time, how much research he’ll have to do – in order to, well, <em>not</em> sound like somebody who’d rang up a sex dungeon at 5am and decided to book an appointment on a whim.</p><p>A more pressing issue, though, is that Jonghyun had booked a session with a specific Mistress, without so much as reading what her preferences are. Opening up his web browser, he easily manages to find the website which he’d visited just hours before. The colour scheme is just as ugly as he remembers it. When he clicks on the <em>Dominants Available</em> tab, this time, he’s holding his breath.</p><p>Scrolling down until he finds Key, he feels his heart stop in his chest.</p><p><strong><em>KEY</em></strong> <strong>| </strong><em>Male Dominant specialising in impact play, slave training, and sensory deprivation. No timewasters. </em></p><p>
  
</p>
<hr/><p>
  
</p><p>“Hey, watch out!”</p><p>Jonghyun leaps back onto the pavement, flustered, as the motorcyclist who’d almost run him over drives off down the road. Cursing himself for not paying enough attention to his surroundings, he locks his phone, and puts it in his back pocket.</p><p>He knows he’s on the right street. The ahjumma at the fruit stall he’d passed had told him that much. The problem is, Hongdae seems to have a particularly high turnover rate of indie coffee shops – so high, in fact, that Naver Map can’t keep up. Sighing, Jonghyun tries to cross the street again – making sure to look both ways this time – and turns right, having already explored the area to his left. Every building he passes looks the same, and with each minute that goes by, Jonghyun’s hopes of arriving on time become slimmer and slimmer. It’s a good job he left his apartment twenty minutes early.</p><p>When he’d read Key’s profile, he would be lying if he said he wasn’t shocked. Even more so when he realised, as he scrolled further down the webpage, that only two of the Dominants advertised were male. There had been about a 1/10 chance of Jonghyun picking the gender that he wasn’t interested in. And yet, as he sat there in front of his laptop, his dreams of being bossed around by a voluptuous woman in high heels slowly dissipating, he came to a realisation. There wasn’t anything inherently sexual about the idea of being dominated. Taemin had described serving his mistress as being something that brought him clarity; that stopped him from dissociating, and gave meaning to his otherwise uneventful life. In the end, wasn’t that all that Jonghyun wanted?</p><p>Anyway, when it came down to it, Jonghyun would be in control of the session. He’d read about what would happen – had spent the rest of the day browsing online forums after the phone call had ended – and he knew that any respectable Dom wouldn’t force him to do things that he wasn’t comfortable with. Plus, if it turned out Jonghyun really couldn’t deal with being tied up by another man, nobody would force him to go back. The session would only last about an hour. After that, he was at total liberty to go on and find the Mistress of his dreams. Hopefully, the second time, he wouldn’t even need to be drunk whilst booking it.</p><p>(Jonghyun tries not to admit it to himself, but the single, short sentence at the end of Key’s profile – <em>No timewasters</em> – had definitely played a part in him not ringing up immediately to cancel his booking, especially after he’d already handed over his email address.)</p><p>Pouting his lips as he swings his head left to right, trying to read all the shopfront signs, Jonghyun feels a buzz coming from his pocket. He reaches for his phone, and is thankful when he sees a new email notification. It’s Key, responding to his plea for help.</p><p>
  <em>Keep walking towards Yeonnam Road. There’s a giant poodle statue outside. You can’t miss it.</em>
</p><p>Jonghyun looks up. Sure enough, in the distance, he sees the pink statue standing proudly above the signs set out by the surrounding shops.</p><p>When he opens the door, bell ringing above his head, he is surprised to notice that, in fact, the entire café is poodle themed. Pawprints have been painted onto the walls, and the bakery section behind the counter is filled with poodle-shaped cakes, pastries, and sandwiches. As he makes his way over to the seating area, he notices that even the staff uniforms have been embroidered with little pawprints.</p><p>Unsurprisingly, it seems as though 90% of the guests here are either female, or boyfriends who have been dragged along on dates. It’s easy, then, to notice the man sitting alone by one of the windows, wearing the same black Nike hat that Key had described in one of his previous emails. Jonghyun gulps, stopping in his tracks. He tries to calm his nerves a little before he heads over, but, to his dismay, Key looks up, gaze finding Jonghyun’s almost immediately.</p><p>Feeling a little exposed, Jonghyun sheepishly walks over to the table. Surprisingly, the man seems to be around the same age as him. “Hello,” he says, bowing politely. “Are you Key?”</p><p>Key follows suit, standing up to return the bow, and replies, “Hello. Yes, that’s me.” He extends an arm to gesture to the seat opposite, smiling warmly at Jonghyun. “Please, sit.”</p><p>Jonghyun complies. Key is taller than him, but his frame, draped in a baggy t-shirt, seems slight, and his shoulders a little narrower. His hair, mostly hidden underneath his hat, is dyed a dark blond colour; across one of his eyebrows, there is a scar, giving his features an asymmetrical sort of charm.</p><p>Key slides a menu across the table to Jonghyun. “I was waiting for you to come before I ordered. Have you been here before?”</p><p>Jonghyun laughs. Leaning over to browse the selection of drinks, he finds that each one appears to have a dog pun in its name. “Actually, no. Is there any reason you chose a poodle café?”</p><p>He lifts his head up to look at Key, who shrugs. “Poodles are cute,” he says, matter-of-factly.</p><p>“Can’t argue with that.”</p><p>They both order drinks. Jonghyun gets a paw-puccino, whilst Key goes for a more extravagant sounding iced caramel yappy-ato. When the waitress leaves, Jonghyun turns to Key, his leg bouncing underneath the table. He opens his mouth, wanting to say something to break the silence, but his mind goes blank.</p><p>Key smiles, softly. “Hey, don’t be nervous. Have you ever booked a session like this before?”</p><p>Jonghyun bites down on the inside of his cheek, hard. Reluctantly, he shakes his head.</p><p>“It’s okay. Thank you for being honest with me. Actually, we get first-timers all the time.” Key leans back in his chair, one arm outstretched on the table, and tilts his head in curiosity. “Do you sub, usually? Or are you just looking to explore that side of yourself?”</p><p>“Umm…I guess…” Jonghyun responds, eyes flicking around himself nervously. It’s embarrassing, talking about this stuff in public – in fact, it’s embarrassing talking about this stuff at all. “I’ve never tried it. But I want to.”</p><p>“Great. You’ve come to the right place. It’s better to hire someone who knows what they’re doing, so you can learn safely. Do you have any idea what you might be into?”</p><p>Jonghyun feels his face go hot. This past week, he’s watched more porn than he has in his entire life, in an effort to prepare himself for this exact question. Some of the videos he saw, he’s still a little scarred from; others, though, had only served in sparking Jonghyun’s interest, and sending his imagination into overdrive.</p><p>His right leg is still wobbling, and he watches Key’s eyes flick down to stare at it. Self-consciously, he sits up straighter in his seat, leaning forwards, and lowers his voice. “I saw that you specialise in impact play, right? I think I’d be the most interested in that. Whips, canes, floggers…” He stares at the centre of the table, unable to meet Key’s eyes. Before the other can respond, the waitress returns with their drinks; Jonghyun’s comes in an ordinary coffee cup, whilst Key’s comes in a tall milkshake glass, whipped cream spilling over the sides, topped with a swirl of caramel sauce. He hears Key thank the waitress, distantly, and takes a sip of his own coffee, suddenly regretting his order.</p><p>“You remember my specialties. How sweet.” Jonghyun’s eyes snap to Key, ready to defend himself, but the fond look on Key’s face makes the words die in his throat. “Of course I can do that for you. But, since it’s your first time, we’ll have to start slow. I won’t be busting out the cat o’ nine tails right away. Is that okay?”</p><p>Jonghyun nods his head, not even knowing what a cat o’ nine tails is. “That’s fine. I’d prefer it, if we started slow.”</p><p>For some reason, Jonghyun’s response causes Key to stare at him pensively for a few moments, eyes roaming over his features. “Okay,” Key finally continues, “then, how about restraints? Would you like to be chained up, or handcuffed?”</p><p>“I…think I’d like it,” replies Jonghyun. He’d even bought handcuffs, and used them once or twice – never on himself, but he could see the appeal. They were hot.</p><p>“What about rope bondage?”</p><p>Jonghyun squints. “What, you mean the Japanese one?”</p><p>Raising one eyebrow, an amused smirk tugging at his lips, Key replies, “not necessarily – but, sure, what about shibari?”</p><p>“It looks…interesting?” Jonghyun runs a hand through his fringe, a little embarrassed for getting ahead of himself. “I wouldn’t mind it, though. If you like it, you can try it.”</p><p>The thoughtful look returns to Key’s face, and Jonghyun wonders what he’s thinking about. He drags his yappy-ato closer, whipped cream wobbling as it moves, parts of it already dripping down onto the table. “If I like it, huh,” Key says, echoing Jonghyun’s words, before taking a long sip. Jonghyun averts his eyes. “Okay. What about humiliation, name calling, that kind of thing? How would you like me to speak to you?”</p><p>At that, Jonghyun sucks in a breath. Honestly, he doesn’t know. “I don’t want you to go too easy on me. But nothing too harsh, either.”</p><p>Key nods his head in understanding. “Noted,” he says, “we can test it out. Is there anything else you might want to try? Don’t be too embarrassed – I’ve heard it all before.”</p><p>Jonghyun stares at him. Puzzled, he takes a second to think back over all the porn he’d watched. Nothing in particular springs to mind, so he shakes his head.</p><p>“Okay. What about your limits? What wouldn’t you like me to do?”</p><p>“Ah. Actually. I wouldn’t like to do anything…sexual.” He pauses, monitoring Key’s facial expression, but it remains carefully neutral, so he continues. “As in, I don’t want anything, uh…inserted inside me. Or put around me.”</p><p>“Gotcha. Anything else?”</p><p>“Uh, I guess, I wouldn’t be into anything too extreme. Nothing involving bodily fluids. Extreme pain. Stuff like that.”</p><p>Key nods, taking another sip of his drink. Somehow, in the few minutes that have passed, his coffee has almost completely disappeared, whilst Jonghyun has barely touched his paw-puccino. “Apart from what you’ve mentioned, is there anything else you’d like to request, or would be uncomfortable with trying? If not, we can talk a little more about safety.”</p><p>“Not as far as I’m aware. But if there’s anything I don’t like, we can stop, right?”</p><p>“Of course,” Key says, sending Jonghyun a reassuring smile. “You’ve heard of safe words before, I’ll assume?” Jonghyun nods. “At Nexus, we use a traffic light system. Green means that the session is going fine and that you feel safe. If I’m ever checking in with you, and you feel like everything is okay and that you want to continue, this is the one you should use. Understand so far?”</p><p>“Yes,” Jonghyun says, listening attentively. He feels like he should have brought a notepad and pen.</p><p>“Great. Next is amber. If ever the scene is getting a little too intense, or you want to check in with me, but you don’t want to stop completely, this is the one you should use. And finally, there’s red. Use this one to stop the scene immediately. If you ever start to feel unsafe, or like you’ve reached your limit, then don’t hesitate to say it,” Key says, his voice stern. “It is important that you do. And if you’re not sure whether to use red or amber, use red. That’s my advice.”</p><p>“Got it,” replies Jonghyun. “Green for go, amber for careful, red for stop. I know how to drive.”</p><p>“Funny,” says Key, his tone absolutely deadpan. “I’ll test you before we begin the session, though, just to make sure.”</p><p>Jonghyun looks away, nodding his head. He knows that they have to take this stuff seriously. But he’s sure he won’t forget – in fact, he’d heard about this system whilst he was doing his research, and had half-expected to have to use it with Key.</p><p>“Finally, before you come, make sure you’re clean. It sounds silly to say, but some clients don’t seem to know what a shower is,” Key says, his nose scrunching up slightly. Jonghyun laughs. “And if you’re ever thinking about turning up under the influence of anything – drugs or alcohol – just don’t. I will know. And I will show you to the door.”</p><p>Of course, he’s heard this all before. Jonghyun simply nods. “Got it. Don’t worry about it.”</p><p>Key smiles at him. “Okay. I think that’s everything—oh, Onew already asked if you had any injuries or illnesses, right?” Jonghyun must look confused, because Key clarifies, “The guy on the phone?”</p><p>“Ah, yes, he did.”</p><p>“Perfect – he sent me your file, but I couldn’t quite remember. If you’re ever injured in the future, make sure you let me know before the session, okay?”</p><p>“No problem,” Jonghyun replies, a little freaked out that they have him on file, and he hasn’t even visited the dungeon yet. He picks up his coffee – it’s lukewarm by now, so he’s able to down it. The taste is bitter as it hits the back of his throat. When he sets down the cup, Key is staring at him. “What?”</p><p>The blond points at his own lip. “You need to wipe it.”</p><p>Jonghyun wipes his mouth and, sure enough, he feels the foam bubbles against the back of his hand. “Uh, thanks,” he says. “So, that’s it?”</p><p>“Yep, that’s it,” Key replies, flashing his teeth at Jonghyun. “Are you still feeling nervous?”</p><p>Honestly, now that Jonghyun knows what to expect, he’s feeling a lot more relaxed about the whole ordeal. Key’s got a nice personality, too; he didn’t make Jonghyun feel bad about being inexperienced, and his calm, professional aura made it easy to open up about his newly discovered interests. He hopes that the Key he meets at the session isn’t much different. “No, I’m feeling okay, now.”</p><p>“Fabulous,” says Key, clapping his hands together. He pushes his chair out, standing up with a stretch, and Jonghyun follows, a smile on his face. When they get to the counter, Jonghyun balks as Key shoos him away, murmuring, “It’s on me, don’t worry. First time always is.”</p><p>It feels strange, letting another man pay for his drinks; but then, Jonghyun supposes, this whole situation is quite strange. He should probably get used to it. “Thank you,” he says instead, quietly.</p><p>Key flashes him a smile. They walk outside together and, just before they part ways, Key reminds him, “If you have any questions, email me, alright? I’ll be in touch to arrange the time.”</p><p>Jonghyun nods, “I will,” before dipping into a low bow. “See you then, Key.”</p><p>Grinning as he bows in return, Key replies, “Looking forward to it.”</p>
  </div></div>
</body>
</html>